Dissention
by Amber Skye
Summary: When Aelita discovers that Xana has been stealing not just her memory but also her dreams, she decides it's time to retaliate. But her simple mission to infiltrate and gather information goes horribly wrong, in a way they could never have imagined...
1. To Sleep, Perchance To Dream

Disclaimer: I do not own Code Lyoko. If I did, Sissi would not be so annoying, William would not have been turned evil, and Aelita would still live on Lyoko. Yeah.

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**Code Lyoko**

**:Dissention:**

by

_Amber Skye_

--

_Odd dodged to the side as a Creeper spat its laser at him; he had no problems evading the attack and sending an arrow right back. An instant later the creature exploded into fragments, and the number of Xana's monsters was down to four._

_The Manta swooped at him, and Odd fell into an evasive roll. He came up again, wrist angled and ready to send an arrow stinging at the monster's underbelly as it passed over him. But as he loosed his shot, he felt an impact on his left shoulder and the sparking sensation that meant he'd lost some life points. Grimacing, Odd turned his head and followed the angle of the hit to its origin—more Creepers slithering into sight on one of the levels above him._

_Odd growled to himself; this was part of the reason he hated Sector Five. Unlike the other regions, which were more or less flat planes, Sector Five was nothing but a huge, spherical maze of corridors, bridges, walkways, platforms, landings, and pillars, where monsters and attacks could come from any angle. And more often than not, they did. This sector was the core of Xana's existence, and as such there were more monsters here at his beck and call than in any other region of Lyoko. So while Odd wasn't particularly surprised at the appearance of more adversaries, it did nothing to lessen his frustration._

_Bringing himself back to the present, and the level that he was currently on, Odd quickly fired off two rounds at the Tarantula directly across the chamber, hoping to hit it before it could launch an attack at him. The Tarantula only managed to get one arm into a firing position before it took Odd's hit, but it still found just enough time to let loose one of its concentrated laser beams before it began to break apart._

_Odd knew it was coming, and knew similarly that his small arm shield could never block one of those powerful lasers. So he gave a leap from his crouched position, launching himself over the laser—and into a second. The impact plowed him backwards through the air and sent him skidding painfully to the ground, chest sparking. Odd gave a frustrated grunt as he landed, trying to get back on his feet before the monsters took advantage of his fall. A quick roll got him halfway up, and he managed to summon his wrist shield in time to deflect the sudden barrage of three more lasers that converged on his weakened form._

_Disgusted with himself for being forced to play so defensively, he ducked behind the momentary safety of a wide, curved blue beam. He needed to think for a minute, find a way to confuse his enemies and regain the upper hand. He had no intention of being held up by the monsters, not now of all times._

_Odd let his gaze travel upwards, to upper levels with all the countless bridges and catwalks, and the impossibly high ceiling above it. Across one of the blue pathways he could see Yumi running full tilt towards the entrance to the central sphere._

_She was already heading for the core. And Odd knew that if she made it there first, she wouldn't wait for him or Aelita. He needed to catch up to her—now. But with all the Creepers and a Manta still blocking his path…_

_Then he noted the curve of the pillar as it arched upwards and intersected with precisely one of those bridges that he needed to be on, and an idea occurred. Maybe he could just skip battling the monsters completely._

_With a wry grin and a quick motion, Odd latched onto the sheer, smooth side of the pillar and let his claws dig in. His hold firm, he began clambering upwards, away from the monsters and the fight on the lower plane and towards the bridge on the upper level._

_Below him, the Creepers continued to fire at the other side of the pillar, unaware that Odd was no longer pinned down on the ground behind it. The Manta, however, was another story. It swooped around the pillar, unaffected by the limitations of artificial gravity. Finding that its designated target was no longer where it had been, the elegant monster altered its course and turned its sensors upward. It didn't take long to find and target the cat-like human crawling up the sheer surface._

_The Manta's laser blast burned into the side of the pillar, inches away from where Odd's left hand was currently clinging. Letting loose a few choice words, Odd let go of the pillar immediately with that hand, allowing himself to swing freely. From where he dangled, he cocked his left wrist at the monster flying towards him, shooting off two arrows. Thrown off by the strange angle, his first arrow merely glanced off one of the Manta's wings, but the second buried deep into the target mark with the near-perfect accuracy that Odd had developed over the past few months._

_The Manta shattered, its fragments curling through midair like morbid fireworks._

_With the Manta gone and the Creepers below still unaware of where he had gone, Odd continued scuttling up the pillar. A few more yards up he gave a final climbing leap, and landed cat-like on the open bridge that Yumi had crossed just moments before._

"_Jeremie," Odd said to the ceiling, "I'm on the outer section of the central core. Which way now?"_

_Before he could get an answer, a movement caught the corner of his eye, and he saw a flash of bright pink dash around the corner on the far side of the platform. "Nevermind," he said quickly, breaking into a run after the retreating figure. He called out after her, "Aelita! Wait up!"_

_As he dashed after her, a thought occurred to him. The last time he had seen Aelita, she'd been behind him, on the lower levels, cut off from himself and Yumi by the shifting walls and platforms of Sector Five. He wondered vaguely how she'd managed to find a way up here ahead of him so quickly._

_Preoccupied with his immediate surroundings, it didn't register to Odd that Jeremie had never responded._

_Odd rounded the corner—_

—_and suddenly found himself facing the sharp end of a blade. He managed to stop his momentum in time to keep from skewering himself, but it took another moment for his eyes to register what he was seeing. The weapon he had almost run into was none other than Ulrich's sword._

_Odd's gaze traveled up the length of the blade that was aimed at him, down to the hilt where it was held firmly…in Aelita's grasp._

_Aelita?!_

_She stood, her black eyes emotionless as she twisted the hilt in her hands and brought the sword around in a vicious swing._

_There were several things that Odd was trying to comprehend at that moment: how Aelita had gotten Ulrich's sword, why she was attacking him, how he'd been led into an apparent trap. It was all too much too quickly, and he had no time to think, act, or offer any resistance whatsoever._

_The blade sliced cleanly through his abdomen._

_Odd felt the detached sensation of unreal pain as his figure began to break apart, and he faded from Lyoko._

--

**:Four Days Earlier:**

Aelita sat bolt upright, gasping as her eyes came open and the nightmare ended abruptly. It took a long, disorienting moment to realize that she was awake again and completely safe. The calming blue lights of the tower shone around her, silent and undisturbed.

Still panting as the adrenaline began to recede, she leaned back and closed her eyes. This was the third night in a row…

In this one, she had seen herself and Odd fighting on Lyoko. But she had been watching from a distance, as though it hadn't really been she who was doing the fighting. It didn't matter though—from the impact that the nightmare had on her, it might as well have actually been happening. She'd seen herself using a sword, ambushing Odd and cutting him down.

Aelita pressed a hand against her eyes. She really needed to talk to Jeremie.

She moved to the center of the platform, seating herself comfortably cross-legged. Calling up a transparent, blue-tinted screen from thin air, she tapped the few commands that would give her access Jeremie's computer. As she waited for the visual screen to appear, she sat back, thinking about the dream she had just had and why they were occurring.

She had only been materialized in the real world once, and then only for a few hours. When she and her friends had tried to shut Xana down and discovered that her life was now linked to his, she'd opted to remain on Lyoko again until Jeremie could find a way to sever the link and materialize her permanently. Aelita been on Lyoko ever since, but those few hours in the real world seemed to have had a profound influence on her, physically and mentally.

The most obvious of those influences were the dreams, though most nights they seemed more like nightmares. In relation to that, she found that she now needed regular periods of sleep that she had been able to go without before. More physical senses had been activated as well; she could now feel the cold of the polar region in Lyoko, and smell the moisture in the air of the mountain region.

A ready signal from the computer blipped at her, and Aelita turned her attention back to the blank screen before her. She activated the video monitor and spoke softly, hoping he might be awake to hear her. "Jeremie?"

The screen remained blank and unresponsive. Jeremie had shut off the video link completely—she couldn't even see into his room to find out if he was there or not.

Aelita gave a quiet sigh; not one of anger or hurt, but a simple exhalation that indicated she wasn't surprised. Closing the window, she leaned back from the floating screen in front of her, thinking.

It had been nearly two months now since Xana had created his humanoid form. Since then, he had only continued to grow stronger. Aelita's ability to launch time reversals was now severely limited, due to the fact that Xana had modified the program to re-route its power directly to him. The appearance of new monsters such as the Skipazoa had limited her ability to traverse Lyoko; if she ventured out alone, Xana or one of his monsters would note her location sooner or later, and she was likely to be attacked.

That was one of the things that she couldn't yet comprehend—not only had Xana modified his appearance, but he'd changed his motivations and his behavior as well. He'd stopped launching deadly attacks on the real world and was focusing instead on building his power in Lyoko. He was sending his monsters to attack _her_, here in the digital realm. Like the Skipazoa.

To make matters worse, she was left to deal with all this pretty much on her own. Jeremie had become reclusive, avoiding her and the rest of their friends. He was moping, and dwelling on his failures during Xana's last attack rather than trying to resolve them and move forward.

In contrast, Odd had been working hard since that same attack. He made a point of virtualizing himself on Lyoko three or four times a week, even though Xana hadn't made any move to attack recently. Odd would spend hours on the virtual plane, searching for and destroying any of Xana's monsters that he happened to come across.

Aelita let those thoughts drift away as a group of files appeared on the screen before her. She glanced at them quickly, sighing at some of them. One was a vehicle program that Jeremie had been hard at work on before Xana's last attack; now it lay neglected and unfinished in his data files. Another was the materialization program that Jeremie had created for her, to bring her out of Lyoko and into the real world. It too, sat abandoned, untouched since Xana had used it last as a means of materializing himself on earth.

Leaning forward again, Aelita raised her hands to the screen and began gliding them across the transparent surface, dismissing those files and watching intently as data windows sprang to life beneath her fingertips. She opened the program that contained the records of each vision she had experienced, then created a blank template. Pressing three fingers lightly to the empty window, she concentrated. A bluish-white glow of energy surrounded her hand, and data began to filter onto the transparent screen. Incoherent lines of symbols scrolled quickly by as the energy was translated into code.

She could feel the aftereffects of the dream whirling through her emotions as she held it at the front of her mind, reliving the unconscious events. It had been another frightening one, filled with vague imagery that she did not understand, and it had left a lingering aftertaste of cold fear.

After a few moments, Aelita blinked her eyes open and withdrew her hand. The file template sat open on the screen, no longer blank. Nodding for no particular reason, Aelita saved the file and stored it with the others.

Now finished with the recording of her dream sequence, Aelita drew her hands once again over the screen, bringing up more information. Within seconds the data collected from Sector Five blinked into existence before her.

She wasn't looking for anything in particular, but she needed something to distract her from the vision she had just had, and since Jeremie wasn't willing to converse with her, she might as well get some work done.

--

The all-encompassing sapphire hue of Sector Five might have seemed maddening to some. The bright, bold color, with its little variant in shade, was nearly a light source in itself. It reflected off any surface and pressed in from all angles with its stark simplicity. But while the color palette was unnervingly straightforward, the area that it adorned was anything but.

The entire structure seemed to be composed of nothing but right angles. Blocks, squares, cubes, beams, and columns that shifted and moved in incomprehensible patterns, only fathomable to the artificial intelligence that drove them.

Any living, biological being would feel oddly out of place in Sector Five, and rightly so. But to Xana, it was more than the comfort of home. It was, in essence, _him._ And while he was currently embodied as a humanoid figure, the awareness that was himself extended far beyond that which was his physical manifestation. The human shape was a tool, a mask used to interact with and deceive his enemies. It was a simple as creating himself in their image, Xana mused, in more ways than one.

He stood in a large chamber, its four walls filled with countless glowing screens that scrolled endless lines of information. To one side were four large pillars, which could have been mistaken for support structures if not for the fact that they were hollow and transparent. In the center of the room were what looked like three giant test tubes, large enough for a person to swim in, all of them filled with some sort of liquid.

Hands tucked behind his back, Xana was watching the swirl of bio-fluid in the center test tube. In reality the liquid was a semi-transparent white, but in the core chambers of Sector Five it was tainted with the omnipresent blue of its surroundings. Nothing but ever-shifting rivulets of an opaque, syrupy consistency could be seen in the tank, yet Xana observed it as if he could see something that was not there.

Despite the fact that it was not yet big enough to be seen by a human eye, Xana knew that his experiment was growing within that tank. All the information showed it to be functioning within expected parameters, developing at a slow but constant rate. He just needed to be patient, that was all.

Nodding to himself, Xana allowed a serene smile to cross his features. Patience. That was what he had been missing before, all those times when he tried and failed, launching attack after attack at the humans and getting nowhere because of Aelita and her human friends. He'd been frustrated—angry even—and unwilling to take his time.

But then again, he hadn't had time to waste. Jeremie had always been working towards making Aelita human, and the moment he was successful, Xana had known they would shut him down. Xana had been _forced_ to work quickly, for the sake of self-preservation. But his actions bred from desperation had been frighteningly unsuccessful.

And then, _then_ he'd managed to create his virus. Xana nearly laughed out loud at the thought. That glorious virus, now thick in Aelita's veins, the virus that tied her life to his. And while she was infected, they couldn't touch him.

He had all the time in the world.

And he'd been using it well, Xana decided, giving himself some mental congratulations. The latest version of his project was even a bit ahead of schedule—ready for the next phase, perhaps.

Xana mused over that possibility for a moment. He was eager to test his theory and see if the biological material would have the proper effect. He'd run the calculations numerous times, and all the results had come back with favorable indications. The chances were good that this first project would succeed, but even if some unknown variable caused it to fail, he still had the two secondary organisms for backup.

The humanoid nodded to himself. Yes, he was ready to continue. The next time they set foot on Lyoko, he would take the human.

Behind him there was the soft, leathery sound of something moving and a _whoosh_ of air. Xana turned to see one of his graceful Mantas drifting towards him, slowing to a stop in midair. It let out a smooth hooting sound that modulated and echoed, strangely calm and haunting, like a whale song.

Xana nodded at the creature, pleased. "Aelita is awake again, then?" he asked for no particular reason. "Let us see what she has for me this time."

Dismissing the manta ray with a wave of his hand, Xana crossed to a point near the wall and summoned a transparent screen from midair. From there it was all too easy to gain access to Aelita's private stash of dream files.

--

Aelita was starting to feel tired again. The nightmare had interrupted the normal eight-hour sleep cycle, and the fatigue it left behind was starting to catch up with her. She yawned—another thing she had never done before being materialized—and was about to close her screen when a tiny alert in the corner caught her attention.

Immediately all thought of sleep fled from her mind. She dismissed the other files and quickly accessed the warning system. Xana was hacking into her systems _again. _Biting back an angry expletive, Aelita opened a new screen along with a file that Xana hadn't accessed, and activated her new tracer program.

This was the fifth time Xana had stolen from her private dream files. Each time, Aelita tried to create a new firewall to keep him from getting them, and each time, it failed. But this time, even if she couldn't keep Xana out, maybe she could find out where he was storing them, or even why he was taking them.

"Your Skipazoa steals my memories…your hacking program steals my dreams…" she whispered to the screens, "What are you looking for, Xana?"

She watched with nervous anticipation as her tracer began to follow the hacking trail that Xana had left behind. Codes and data flickered by, and she realized that it was working. It was following the files back to Xana's computer core location; in a few moments, the tables might be turned, and she would have access to _his _files…

But then the tracer stopped, blocked by one of Xana's security levels.

Letting loose a breath of frustration, Aelita leaned back from the screen and stared upwards at the infinite ceiling. She couldn't do _anything_ from here. Xana's programming was more sophisticated than her own, and he was too practiced at covering his own tracks. Probably the only reason her tracer program had made it as far as it did was because Xana had allowed it.

The only way she might be able to find the files was if she could access the Sector Five program directly. But she'd have to actually be _in _Sector Five to do that.

An idea tickled the back of Aelita's mind at the thought.

_No. Too risky._ Her common sense stated it simply, immediately, and under any other circumstances she would have accepted her first instinct. But tonight the restlessness and frustration were gnawing at her rational thoughts. She felt restricted, cut off from the rest of the world since Jeremie no longer spoke to her, and a chance to do something, to vent some of this pent-up energy, would be welcome.

She would contact Ulrich. Moving a hand across the screen, she started to access his mobile, but then stopped when she saw the chronometer and groaned. It was almost three in the morning—no one would be awake. She'd have to wait.

Dismissing the screen, Aelita dimmed the tower lights and settled back against the platform, wondering if she would dream again.

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Author's Notes: Woo-hoo! So here it is, the official sequel to 'Regression.' I'm so excited about starting this story, I hope everyone likes it!

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	2. A Glimpse of Dissention

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter One. (Yeah, I still don't own it.)

**Author's Notes:** Hey everyone! Thanks for the reviews, you guys are all so awesome! Hope you're still liking the story; it's a bit slow to start, but I promise things will pick up in the next chapter.

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--

It was during one of his morning breaks between classes that Ulrich's mobile rang. Not thinking much of it, he pulled the phone out and looked casually at the name on the screen, planning to flick it open and start conversing right there in the middle of the crowded hallway. As soon as he registered who it was, however, he took a hall leading away from his next class, and ducked into the first empty classroom he saw.

Now alone, Ulrich pressed the button to accept the call, and let the phone bring up a visual screen, too. "Hey Aelita," Ulrich smiled at her when she appeared on the tiny frame. "What's up?"

Though he'd made an effort to make sure no one overheard his conversation, Ulrich wasn't surprised that Aelita had called him. Over the past month he and Aelita had been corresponding more and more on a regular basis, mostly because Jeremie had been acting so anti-social. Jeremie had been ignoring all of his friends, especially Aelita, and she needed some way to still keep in contact with all of them. Connecting to Ulrich's mobile had become her usual method now, and Ulrich didn't mind.

She smiled in return and waved a little greeting. _"Bonjour, Ulrich. Do you have a minute?"_

"Yeah," Ulrich assured her, turning more towards the wall to shield the screen as a few students passed by the doorway. "I've still got a couple minutes before my next class."

"_I won't take too long,"_ Aelita said, _"I just wanted to talk to you as early as possible, so you have time to think about it."_

Ulrich raised an eyebrow. "Okay, what is it?"

"_Remember how I've been having dreams and nightmares since my original materialization on earth?"_

"Of course," Ulrich answered. Aelita's dreams had been a source of concern since they'd first begun. At first, Jeremie had been running tests, wondering if they were a result of damage to her subconscious, or just a normal occurrence as the link between her digital self and physical self was established. He'd never finished his tests though, and Aelita was left to deal with them on her own.

"_I've been keeping records, and Xana is stealing them."_

Ulrich's brow furrowed. "He's already been stealing your memory data with the Skipazoa lately; what would he want with a bunch of dreams?"

From the screen, Aelita shook her head. _"I don't know, and I can't find out from here."_

Ulrich gave a small sigh. "I'm not sure what to tell you, Aelita. It's not like you can control whether you have dreams or not when you're sleeping. They just happen. But maybe you should stop recording them—that way Xana couldn't access them."

"_That's not what I wanted to talk about,_" Aelita shook her head. _"This time, I managed to trace the copied files back to an area in Sector Five. I think that's where Xana is keeping all the data he's stealing from me."_

Ulrich straightened. He knew where this was going now. "You want to infiltrate it, don't you?"

The humanoid nodded. _"If I can access that area directly, we might be able to figure out what Xana is trying to do with all my information."_

Sighing, Ulrich was silent for a moment. The group had been keeping their activities on Lyoko pretty limited lately, mostly because Jeremie refused to operate for them. Thankfully Xana had been quiet since his major attack a little more than a month ago, when Aelita had almost died. Their presence on Lyoko hadn't been needed since there weren't any towers to deactivate, so Jeremie's self-isolation hadn't been detrimental to their mission so far. But if Aelita wanted to infiltrate Sector Five, she was going to need everyone's help.

"We'd have to get Jeremie to operate for us," Ulrich answered finally.

Aelita looked pleading. _"You have to talk to him, Ulrich. It's like he won't even acknowledge my existence anymore, and I can't keep Xana in check by myself like I used to. He's getting stronger…"_

"He's always getting stronger. Especially since we're doing nothing but feeling sorry for ourselves lately. We're practically letting him have free run of Lyoko." Ulrich clenched the phone tighter in his fist out of frustration. "If Jeremie and Odd would just get over it already, we wouldn't have this problem."

"_I don't want to cause an argument," _Now Aelita's expression had changed to worry.

Ulrich shook his head at her. "It's not you, Aelita, don't worry. This is overdue. Someone should have forced them to deal with their issues before now; it's just that none of us had the courage to go through with it." He let out a long breath. "Don't worry," he repeated, "I'll get everyone together. How about you sign onto his computer this afternoon? I'll make sure to open the channel so we can _all_ talk to Jeremie."

Aelita graced him with a relieved smile. _"I will. Thank you, Ulrich."_

"No problem," Ulrich nodded, and watched the screen cut off the communication. Closing the mobile, he slid it back into his pocket, then let his head fall back against the wall, sighing again. "Yeah, no problem at all…"

--

Students packed up books and shouldered backpacks as the last class of the day ended. Those who happened to be nearest to the exits were out the doors and headed for home before the signaling bells had even stopped ringing. Others lingered in room, chatting about various non-school related subjects while a few made their way towards designated afternoon sports or activities.

Yumi was one such lingering student. She sat at her desk for a few moments after the dismissal, jotting some last-minute notes before finally gathering up all her books. She was just standing to leave when William approached.

William Dunbar was still relatively new at school, having just transferred to Kadic a few months ago, but he had been around long enough now that Yumi had grown accustomed to him and his less-than-subtle indications that he rather liked her. He had a knack for showing up wherever she happened to be at any given time, whether it was in the hallways between classes, the cafeteria at lunch, or anywhere else on the campus for that matter. Not that he was annoying; he was far from it actually. He always seemed to be in a good mood, and was more than willing to be helpful and accommodating in any way he could see fit. Ways such as carrying her books, opening the doors for her, or offering to help study with homework assignments…

Yumi shook her head. She'd told him before, more than once in fact, that she didn't feel the same way about him as he obviously felt about her. But still he persisted. She had to give him credit for one thing at least—when he set his mind to something, he worked hard for it and didn't give up. He had taken what she'd told him seriously and with a realistic approach, but while he didn't back off completely, he didn't push their friendship either. That was something for which Yumi was extremely grateful. She did like him, and she liked having him around, but just in a platonic way.

And for now, it worked.

"Hey." He gave her a little wave and a half-grin as he came up to stand beside her desk. "Listen, since we're partners on the next lab assignment, do you want to get together and study tomorrow morning?"

Yumi couldn't help smirking. Another thing about William was that he never beat around the bush. If he wanted to say something, he said it, and didn't let nerves or fear or rejection keep him from trying.

She started to form a response, but out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement near the doorway of her classroom. She turned her head slightly, just enough to see Ulrich stride into view, his gaze intent on her. But he caught sight of William with her then, and stopped. Reversing his direction quickly, he disappeared around the corner, back the way he had come.

William was still talking to her, and hadn't seen Ulrich's abrupt arrival and departure. "…do my chores, but it won't take long," he was saying, trying to give her a time frame for when they could study the next morning. "I'd be done by ten, you could come over if you like, any time after that."

Fully distracted now, Yumi gave him a quick glance and began muttering an excuse as she headed abruptly for the door. "Um, actually, I've got to go right now. Can I call you about it later?"

William nodded and slung his bag over his shoulder, watching her leave. "Sure, no problem."

Yumi gave a backwards glance as she jogged out of the room. "Okay, I'll let you know tonight!" She turned her mind back to the task at hand then, catching up with Ulrich, and let all thoughts of studying with William drop. She made a quick turn around the doorframe, the way she'd seen Ulrich leave, and headed down the long hallway at a decent clip.

Ulrich was already a ways ahead of her, near the double doors that led to the school grounds. She sped up a little bit, calling out. "Ulrich, _matte_! Wait up!"

He turned, holding the door halfway open, and waited as she caught up to him.

"Ulrich, did you want to talk to me?" she asked when she was finally within speaking range. "Why'd you disappear like that?"

He shrugged. "You looked busy."

Yumi balked at that, giving him a look that was somewhere between disgust and frustration. She may have become accustomed to the attention William gave her, but Ulrich certainly had not. "How many times am I going to have to explain it—to _both_ of you—that I don't think about William that way."

Ulrich shrugged again, clearly not wanting to discuss it. Instead, he changed the subject by cutting directly to the matter at hand. "Aelita called my mobile this morning. She needs us on Lyoko."

Yumi immediately forgot how annoyed she was with boys and their thick heads. "Is she okay? Did Xana launch an attack?"

Ulrich shook his head at first, then stopped. "Well, not here, at any rate." He glanced sideways at her as they approached the entrance to a long, low-standing building—one of the dormitories. "But apparently he's been hacking into some of Lyoko's databanks and stealing her dream files."

"Her dreams?" Yumi asked. "She's still having them, huh?"

"Yeah. On a pretty regular basis, too, I think. Otherwise Xana probably wouldn't be interested." Ulrich opened the door to the dormitory, stepping to the side and keeping it open so Yumi could go through in front of him. He crossed the threshold after her and let the heavy door clang shut.

Yumi knew right where they were. This was one of the boy's dormitories, and at first she thought they might be headed for the room that Ulrich and Odd shared. Ulrich took a turn down a different corridor, however, and they headed for the far end of the building.

As they traversed the hallways, Yumi continued her questioning. "So what does Aelita need us for?"

"She wants to infiltrate Sector Five to locate the files and get them back. She thinks she can hack into Xana's programs at the same time and find out what he's doing with them."

Yumi thought for a moment. "Isn't this kind of sudden?"

"Not from her point of view." Ulrich had the answer ready. "How long has it been since you or I have been to Lyoko to prevent an attack?"

Yumi was silent.

"That's because Xana hasn't been doing anything out here in the real world," he continued explaining, "But who knows how much he's been doing on_ Lyoko?_ Aelita's the one who is keeping an eye on him, and if things have built up to a point where she wants to go on the attack, then I think it must be pretty serious."

Ulrich came to a halt then, in front of a closed door to one of the single rooms.

Jeremie's room.

"Oh…" Yumi said, realization dawning on her as to why they had come here.

Folding his arms, Ulrich took up a casual position, leaning against the doorframe. "We're going to need him."

Yumi gave an uncertain glance at the closed door. "To infiltrate Sector Five? Yeah, I guess you're right…" She looked at Ulrich curiously then, since he didn't seem to be doing anything. "So, we have to talk to him then."

Ulrich didn't move. "Yup."

Yumi waited a moment in silence, then began shifting her gaze pointedly between him and Jeremie's door. "Are you waiting for something?"

"Odd."

Her eyebrows shot up at that, startled. "Odd's coming? To help us talk to Jeremie?"

"Yup."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Yumi narrowed her eyes in suspicion.

"Of course it's not a good idea." Ulrich sounded resigned. "But better we get their issues dealt with now rather than wait for Xana to launch another major attack and find out that we can't work as a team anymore."

After a pause, Yumi continued, "Have they even spoken to one another since the last attack?"

"Nope."

"Then he's probably not going to come." Yumi sighed and looked down the hallway.

Ulrich gave a snort. "He'll be here."

Yumi raised an eyebrow.

"I told him that if he didn't show up, I'd tell the principal exactly what happened last Wednesday when he missed classes because he was 'sick.'"

At that, Yumi couldn't hide a smirk. "Odd probably won't respond well to being blackmailed."

"Then he shouldn't do things that I can blackmail him with." Ulrich smirked back.

They fell silent again, but it was only a few moments before they heard the approaching footfalls. On cue, and just as Ulrich had predicted, Odd rounded the corner at a leisurely pace and headed towards them as though he had been planning to meet them all along. The expression he wore, however, was strangely smug considering the circumstances.

Ulrich gave the blonde a quizzical look as he approached. "What are you so happy about?"

Odd grinned with arrogance. "I just broke my record."

He got gawking stares from both of them then, and Yumi had to resist the urge to cuff him right there. "You were on Lyoko _again?_" she chastised.

"Twenty-six monsters this time, single-handedly vaporized!" Odd gave a mock bow, as though expecting praise.

Ulrich blanched. "Aelita should have devirtualized you—"

"Aelita knows better than to get in my way anymore," Odd waved his protest off, then locked him with a hard glare. "Unlike _some _people."

"Don't start—"

Yumi put a hand between the two boys, cutting Ulrich off. "We're here to deal with Jeremie. Let's just focus on that for now, okay?"

Odd smirked in triumph, and Ulrich grudgingly let the issue drop.

Ulrich turned towards Jeremie's door and raised a hand, knocking lightly twice. When there was no response after a few seconds, he opened the door and walked in anyway. The protest didn't come until he was already halfway across the room.

Jeremie swiveled in his chair and gave Ulrich a glowering look. "I didn't tell you to come in."

Ulrich ignored him and moved to stand right in front of the computer. Reaching over Jeremie's shoulder, he punched the button that would open the channel to Lyoko.

"Hey!" Jeremie sprang into action as he realized what was happening. He moved his hand over the keyboard, ready to sever the connection, but Ulrich caught his wrist and held on. An instant later it was too late—the window sprang open and Aelita's face came into view on the screen.

She looked relieved. _"Hi, Jeremie,"_ she said softly.

Jeremie turned his head away with an angry look and jerked his wrist free of Ulrich's grasp. Then he kicked away from the desk, sending his chair rolling backwards, away from the computer.

"We need to talk to you, Jeremie." Ulrich said, no anger or condescension in his voice. It was just a simple statement.

From where she stood still in the hallway, Yumi gave Odd a prodding shove into the room, then stepped in after him and shut the door.

"Are you all ganging up on me now?" Jeremie glared.

"Only because you're not giving us any other options." Yumi's response was curt and quick.

Ulrich leaned against the console table and crossed his arms. "We'll make it as painless as possible, Jeremie. Xana has been stealing Aelita's dreams, and she wants to infiltrate Sector Five to get them back. We need you to operate for us, so you have to stop hiding in your room and start talking to us again."

"Xana is stealing Aelita's dreams?" Jeremie glanced up.

"Long story short, yes." Ulrich responded quickly, not wanting to get drawn into a long explanation at the moment. "And if we're going to have any chance of pulling this off, you have to operate."

Jeremie seemed distracted now. "But what would he want with—"

"That's what we're going to try and find out," Yumi put in.

"That's why we need you to operate," Ulrich finished.

"We heard you the first time, Ulrich." Odd muttered, sarcasm under his statement.

Ulrich shot him a scornful look.

Jeremie was quiet for a moment, then looked up at them with sullen eyes. "I…I can't."

"Why not?" Ulrich countered.

"I _can't_…"

It had been months since the last attack, when Jeremie almost killed both Xana and Aelita. It had been months since he decided to exclude himself from the company of his friends, avoiding them and hiding in his room, refusing to speak to anyone, even Aelita. During that time, Ulrich and Yumi had tried so many times to confront him, to no avail.

And here it was, happening still. He was shutting himself off, refusing to listen, refusing to even try. And quite suddenly, Ulrich decided that he had had enough.

He closed the space between them in an instant, and then his face was level with Jeremie's, his eyes narrowed and dangerous. "Knock it off," he snapped.

Jeremie blinked. "What?"

"I said, knock it off." Ulrich folded his arms, glowering. "Ever since Xana made himself human, you've done nothing but mope around in the saddest excuse for a pity-party I've ever seen."

Jeremie's jaw dropped in surprise, though he wasn't sure if it was because of what Ulrich had said or simply because Ulrich was actually yelling at him.

The dark-haired boy continued his rant. "Just because your IQ happens to be a little higher than usual doesn't mean we expect you to be perfect. You're as human as the rest of us, and you made a mistake. Big deal, Jeremie, it happens to everyone and you're no exception to the rule. Grow up and get over it."

For a moment, silence lingered after the last statement. Then Jeremie began to glower, and folded his arms with a nasty retort, "Get over it, huh? Just like that?" He gave his glasses a hard shove. "I almost _killed _Aelita! Is murdering one of your best friends something you should be able to just 'get over' in a few minutes?"

"It's been _two months!_" Ulrich almost shouted back.

From the corner, Odd gave a snort, as though he found that statement funny somehow. Ulrich rounded on him suddenly.

"And you," he glared, "You aren't any better! You've done the same thing, pushing the rest of us away when all we're guilty of is caring about you."

Odd cocked an eyebrow, surprisingly calm. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me." Ulrich glowered. "Locking yourself on Lyoko for hours on end, not caring about anything except how many monsters you can take out. And you think that somehow it's going to make us respect you more?"

"This just proves me right!" Riled now, Odd started shouting back. "No matter how much extra training I do on Lyoko, you all still think I'm an incompetent screw-up!"

"Odd, use your brain for once. It was _Xana_! He was purposely trying to make you feel inadequate. Will you stop listening to what Xana said and start listening to your real friends? We know you're not weak, and we've never thought of you that way at all!"

Odd gave a snort. "Tell that to Jeremie."

Ulrich clenched his fists like he wanted to pummel the sense into Odd physically. "Get it through your thick skull, Odd! Xana was toying with all of us, and Jeremie especially was angry and upset. _He said things he didn't mean!!_ Just because someone says something doesn't automatically mean it's true! We all did and said things we regret."

Letting his focus on Odd drop for the time being, Ulrich turned back to Jeremie. "For a reality check, Einstein, you _didn't _wind up hurting Aelita after all. If you still feel a little guilty for it, fine. Apologize and move on. It's not that hard." Ulrich gestured to the monitor. "In case you haven't noticed, she's already forgiven you."

Jeremie turned his head, and looked at the screen. Aelita gazed back at him, a soft expression on her features. _"I was never angry at you, Jeremie."_

Turning away again, Jeremie let his gaze drop. Almost too softly for them to hear, he whispered, "I know."

"Then why are you isolating yourself like this?" Yumi spoke up finally, her voice softer, more understanding, in contrast to Ulrich's anger and Odd's indifference.

"I don't know." Jeremie pulled of his glasses and pressed a hand hard into his eyes, trying to push back the burning sensation. "I don't know what else to do." And then everything seemed to spill out, all the uncertainties that had built up since his actions during the last attack, all the remorse and anger and fear. "I didn't see what Xana was planning, and I walked right into his set up. I did exactly what he wanted me to do, and put all of you in the worst situation possible because of it. Ulrich got hurt, Yumi was completely under Xana's control, and I yelled at Odd, and left you all on your own to track down Xana when I shoudn't have. And the only thing that came of it was that I almost killed Aelita…" He swallowed. "I almost got _all _of you killed…"

"And you think you need to be punished for that?" Yumi's voice was low, full of nothing but honest concern.

He sighed. "_Je ne sais pas_. No. Maybe. I don't know."

She knelt next to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Even if that's the case, Jeremie…don't you think you've punished yourself enough by now?"

For a long moment, no one said anything. Odd remained stoic and removed, arms folded, his gaze pointedly averted towards the door. Ulrich stood, eyes locked on Jeremie, not accusing, just waiting. Yumi stayed crouched where she was, looking at each of them in turn. Aelita watched from her strange angle at the computer, quiet and worried.

Finally, Jeremie put an end to the silence. "Okay," he almost whispered, "I'll operate."

--

From the privacy of Sector Five, Xana watched with mild interest as the scene on the monitor before him unfolded.

Spying on Jeremie and his friends was a simple matter, and more recently, an entertaining one. The tinny sound of their angry voices and frustrated arguments came through the speakers and Xana smiled to himself, an eerie expression that seemed foreign and unnatural on his features.

The dissention among his human adversaries had been a pleasant aftereffect of his previous endeavors. Revealing himself in a humanoid form to taunt and threaten them on a physical level seemed to have made the impact of his actions far more devastating that usual. They had taken things more personally, especially Jeremie. Of course, the squabbling between them would not last forever—he didn't expect it to. But for the time being, it was working in his favor to distract them.

Xana allowed himself a pleased chuckle, speaking softly to the emptiness around him. "If they cannot settle their emotional turmoil, they cannot focus their efforts on discovering what _I_ am doing."

And that, of course, was exactly what he wanted. Even if they did proceed with the little expedition they were planning, they would never get deep enough into the files to find his project. It was too secure even for Jeremie to hack into, Xana had made sure of that.

The humanoid smiled to himself. They were coming to Lyoko on their own—he hadn't even needed to launch an attack to lure them here. It was humorous, the humans taking the bait to a trap that hadn't even been set.

Lifting his arm, Xana held his hand out in front of him, palm flat and facing upwards. Just above it, two small, bright orbs began to form, floating above his hand and around each other like two orbiting planets in a tiny solar system. They spun and moved gently, becoming more and more recognizable with each passing moment. Soon they were glowing a pal reddish-orange, transparent and complete.

Xana dropped his hand, and the two small guardians continued to hover on their own in front of him. "When they arrive, bring me the human," he said, "You know which one I want."

Both orbs bobbed in unison, then sped off, rocketing away like two luminous bullets.

Xana smiled.

--


	3. What Fools These Mortals Be

Disclaimer: See Chapter One. (Didn't own it then, don't own it now, probably won't own it next chapter, either...)

Author's Notes: Hi everybody! Thanks for your reviews, you don't know how encouraging they are, and what a difference they make for me. As promised, the action picks up in this chapter.

--

Yumi sat in her bedroom later that night, finishing the last of her history homework. She made the last few scratches on the paper, double-checked the final reference quickly, then closed the book. Leaning back on the floor mat with a sigh, she settled her hands behind her head and let her eyes drop halfway closed. She stared at the ceiling, thinking, deciding that she would relax for just a few minutes before getting ready for bed.

After confronting Jeremie, they had all decided it would be best to plan their infiltration of Sector Five for tomorrow rather than that afternoon. Odd had already used up his virtualization card that day for 'training' on Lyoko, and the computer wouldn't reset his sequence for another use until the twenty-four hour time mark. Besides, there were no classes tomorrow, so they'd have all day to complete their mission, if necessary.

She shifted, the reeds in the mat beneath her making their familiar _thrush_ sound. It had been so long since she'd last gone to Lyoko – she and Ulrich both. Nearly two months without a single threat from Xana, and she realized now how unusual that was, and wondered why she hadn't given it much thought before. Maybe it was because of the last attack Xana had launched, and how devastating it had been. Ulrich and Aelita almost dying, Jeremie going crazy and Odd getting picked on…maybe they'd all needed a break from it for a while.

Yumi pushed the thoughts away. She couldn't dwell on those things anymore; they were already said and done. What mattered was going to Lyoko tomorrow, and now that the realized how long it had been, she started to worry a bit. She vaguely remembered Odd going on about a new monster that he and Aelita had discovered on one of his solo training sessions. She also remembered tuning him out, because she'd been tired of his bragging. Yumi cringed at herself a bit, wishing now that she had paid a bit more attention. The last thing she wanted was to have to confront an unfamiliar enemy after being out of practice for two months.

Then there was Aelita, whom she hadn't seen or talked to during this whole time. Yumi wondered if Aelita had seen any other changes on Lyoko, if she was upset at all for having been practically ignored for so long—

The door to her room banged open, and a small figure dashed forward, whooping and shouting uproariously.

Yumi sat up, alert. "Hiroki! What do you think you're do—hey!"

Hiroki yelled incomprehensibly in triumph as he snatched up a handful of her homework papers and made a beeline for the door.

Yumi made a made lunge for him, and missed. "Give those back!"

Hiroki looked back just long enough to stuck his tongue out as he dashed into the hallway.

Yumi scrabbled to her feet and started after him, still hollering, "Hiroki, get back here right now or else—"

Behind her, something banged into her window.

Yumi halted at the threshold to her room, looking back, startled. She hung there for an instant, and a moment later the noise was repeated as another object struck the glass with a solid _thunk_.

Something was outside.

Forgetting about Hiroki, she crossed the room and opened the window, looking down into the small, fenced yard beneath. William stood on the grass, his arm cocked back as he prepared to launch another pebble at her second-story room. Luckily, he saw her head come into view and stopped his throw in time.

"William?" Yumi squinted into the darkness. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Hey, Yumi," He dropped his hand and the pebbles with it. "What's up?"

Yumi cocked an eyebrow. "Um…you're standing on my lawn in the dark, throwing rocks at my window. I'm the one who's asking _you_ that."

He grinned at that, shoving his hands in his pockets. "You got me there."

"Why did you come to my window?" Yumi cocked an eyebrow at him. "We have a doorbell."

"Yeah, well," William started, his voice sounding like it was coming up with an excuse on the spot, "All the lights were off downstairs, and I thought maybe everybody else was sleeping. And I didn't want to be rude or anything and wake them up."

Curious, Yumi leaned a bit farther out over the window frame, glancing down at the rest of her house. There was a light coming from the kitchen area downstairs. "What do you call that, then?" She pointed.

William rolled his eyes, but he was grinning. "Geez, Yumi, can't a guy try to set up some sort of romantic mood without getting shot down?"

"Romantic?" Yumi scoffed.

"It's a classic scenario!" William held up his hands for emphasis. "The guy sneaking out at night to see the girl on her balcony…"

"My bedroom window is hardly a balcony." Yumi tried to sound stern but was unable to keep a smile from creeping across her lips. "Besides, that sort of thing is so cliché."

"Cliché is such a negative term."

Yumi attempted to give a frustrated snort at William's continuing banter, but an amused chuckle escaped her at the same time, and the whole thing came out sounding like a strange cough. She had to give him his due—he never quit. "Seriously, William," she said, sobering her tone and trying to get to the reason for this late-night visit. "What did you want?"

He complied, giving her a straight answer. "Well, you never got back to me, so I wanted to know if we were still on for tomorrow morning."

Yumi resisted the urge to slap her forehead in embarrassment. "Oh no, William, _gomennasai!_ I'm sorry, I completely forgot!"

"Oh." His head fell a bit at her sudden and honest answer, and she couldn't really blame him. She could think of nothing worse for a guy's ego than to be utterly forgotten by a girl. After a moment however, he shrugged it off and looked back up at her. "That's okay. You're still coming though, right?"

She bit at her lip as a wave of guilt assaulted her. "Actually…" In the dark, she couldn't see his exact expression, but she could hear him give a bit of a sigh, like he knew that what he was about to hear wouldn't be good. She had to say them anyway."Well…something…came up." The words sounded lame—exactly like the excuse they were. Gritting her teeth, she plowed ahead, hoping that maybe if she kept talking he wouldn't notice. "It, ah, turns out that I'm going to be busy tomorrow morning, and I don't know how long it will take."

"Ah..." He sounded genuinely disappointed, but not surprised. If she'd forgotten to call him, what else could he have expected? He spoke again, his voice quickly covering the disappointment. "Well, that's all right. Did you want to give me a call whenever you're done? We could study later."

Yumi thought for a moment. Infiltrating Sector Five would take a while, she was sure, but certainly not all day. And they were getting an early start. "That might work," she answered, glad that William was so accommodating. She didn't want to put him off completely—she actually did like the idea of studying with him. "I can't say exactly when, but yeah, okay."

"Okay, great!" William took it in stride.

He grew quiet then, not sure of what else to say. Yumi waited, not having anything to say herself. The silence grew for a few long, awkward seconds, until finally Yumi shifted and let out a breath. "Well…I guess I'll talk to you tomorrow then."

William took the cue, "Right. Tomorrow." He gave her a wave, then started to leave. "Talk to you then!"

Yumi waved back, watching as he strode off her lawn and back onto the sidewalk. He gave several glances back over his shoulder as he headed down the street, back towards his house, taking a few last looks at her as she stayed by the window. Then he made the turn at the corner, and the night was quiet and still.

Except for a soft _whoop_ that came from somewhere behind her, near her bedroom door.

Yumi whirled. "Hiroki!"

Her brother poked his head completely into view, unafraid. "Ooooooo! _Onee-chan_, you were talking to _William_, weren't you?" His face split into a huge, teasing grin. "Wait 'till _Ulrich_ finds out, he'll be _jealous_—"

Hiroki cut off with an involuntary shriek of terror and delight, turning to run as Yumi charged the few steps between them, grabbing for him.

"_Baka!_" Yumi was shouting as she caught him around the middle, "You little snitch, don't spy on me!"

He squirmed and wriggled, still gasping and laughing, protesting until the end. "I was just doing what you told me to!"

"I never told you to spy on me!"

"You told me to come back!" Hiroki pulled the scrap of homework paper out of his pocket and waggled it triumphantly in her face. "You said, 'Hiroki, get back here right now or else—'"

Yumi gave a growl of frustration, snatched her homework back from him, and unceremoniously tossed him out the door. "Pest!" She slammed the door.

Hiroki rolled on the floor of the hallway, immensely pleased with himself and still laughing at the success of his own mischief. After a moment he calmed down, and climbed back to his feet. He pulled a face at his sister's closed door, then turned and headed for his own room, satisfied that he'd been annoying enough for tonight.

--

A few miles away, a single light shone from a ground-floor window in one of Kadic academy's dormitories. For the first time in a long while Jeremie was up late, running his computer. On the screen in front of him were several files and programs from Lyoko, some of them going through test runs, some of them simply waiting for him to start scanning. In one corner of the computer face, a different window stood open, with Aelita looking out from her tower on Lyoko.

Jeremie kept scanning files, his eyes darting back and forth between the information and Aelita's window. He looked nervous, and it was unusual for him. Aelita couldn't stay quiet for long. "_Are you all right, Jeremie?_"

"It's just…been a while…since I operated." Jeremie winced with guilt as he spoke. "The programs haven't been updated in more than a month, the vehicles I was designing aren't really finished…"

She nodded at him. "_I know. You'll want to look at the schematics that I created for all the new monsters, too. Odd and I discovered them…_" Aelita trailed off and seemed to look down a bit, focusing on something below the screen. "_Here, I'm bringing up the files and sending them to you. The first one is what gave us the most trouble, there have been three times now when it managed to steal some of my memory files—_"

Jeremie started. "What?"

"_My memory files_." Aelita repeated. "_This monster is designated as a Skipazoa, and it appeared on Lyoko a few months ago. Sometimes when I leave the towers, I'll run into one of them; they try to latch onto me and siphon the information_."

He scrolled through the information that she was sending him. "This monster was stealing your _memory_? And you never told me?"

She blinked at him. "_Jeremie, you never gave me a chance to tell you anything_."

He looked away, a color of shame rising in his cheeks. "I know…"

Her eyes were still on him, still regarding him with a soft smile on her features. "_But I'm really glad that now I can talk to you again,_" she said.

Jeremie looked up at her screen, gazing at her with something between guilt and awe. He spoke softly, not thinking. "Aelita, you're amaz…" He trailed off as he realized what he was about to say.

She blinked. "_What?_"

Jeremie flushed unexpectedly and looked down at the keyboard. "Nothing. I mean, nevermind. I, ah…nevermind…"

"_Oh_." Aelita looked down too, disappointed.

There was silence between them then, as Jeremie continued to type, trying to focus on his programs again after so long. But her window was still open, and she was still looking at him from Lyoko, her eyes wide and sad and grateful and happy and relieved and searching all at the same time…

He couldn't stand it anymore. He dropped his hands and fell heavily against the back of his computer chair. "Aelita, how can you…I mean, you're being…" He smacked his head in frustration and his sudden inability to form complete sentences. "I don't understand why!"

"_Why what?_"

"Why you're so understanding!" He finally burst out saying. "Why you actually want to be here helping me, talking to me over the computer just like we used to, why you're still so nice to me after I almost killed you, after I ignored you, after I was such a…a…"

"_Jerk?_" Aelita finished for him.

Jeremie's mouth dropped open in surprise at the ease with which she agreed with him. And insulted him. Granted, that's what he had been thinking, but never would he have ever expected Aelita to voice it, and certainly not so quickly. He stammered a bit then, trying to think of a reply, or an excuse, or an argument, he wasn't sure which.

She giggled at him, amused that he was so flustered. "_It's okay, Jeremie._" Her face turned more somber then. "_I can understand a little how you must have felt. I feel guilty every time any one of you is in danger in the real world because of Xana's attacks._"

"But those attacks aren't your fault!" Jeremie blurted, "I mean, you're not the one putting people in danger. It's all Xana. What do you have to feel guilty about?"

Her response was calm and reasonable. "_Well, if it weren't for me, you'd have shut Xana down the moment you discovered him, right?_"

He was a bit taken aback by the simple way she stated her logic. "Well…ah…yes, but—"

"_So it is sort of my fault that Xana is still operational, still launching attacks and trying to cause harm to everyone in your world._"

Jeremie stared at her.

Aelita saw his expression and quickly gave a small laugh, as though trying to relieve tension. "_I'm sorry, I've just had more time lately to think about it. And the things that happened during Xana's last attack just made it more clear than before, that's all._" She spoke so…simply. Her voice was still light and innocent, unbothered. "_If not for me, you could have killed Xana then and there, and it would all be over. It would have been over long before now_."

"Aelita…" Jeremie was looking at her, with an intensity of emotion that she'd never seen before. His eyes were wide, worried, guilt-ridden. "Have we…have I been making you feel that way? This whole time?"

"_Oh, no, of course not! That isn't what I meant at all…_" She stared off into the distance for a moment, trying to focus her thoughts. "_In fact, having all of you around to talk to makes me feel a lot better_. _It's just when I'm by myself that I start thinking about it too hard and I suppose I get a little depressed_."

"I'm so sorry, Aelita…"

"_It's okay, Jeremie,"_ she said again, _ "I'm glad to have you back._"

She meant it. As much as he found it hard to believe, he could tell that she really meant it. Jeremie felt an overwhelming urge to hug her then, and the unexpectedness and intensity of it surprised him a little. Feeling heat rise to his face again, he averted his gaze from the screen for a moment, rubbing nervously at the back of his neck.

When he looked back again, she was smiling softly at him, the ever-present sincerity still mingled with her features. And he couldn't for the life of him remember why he'd avoided her for so long.

--

Odd was the first to arrive at the factory the next morning. But then, he was probably the most eager of all of them to go back to Lyoko. He had been to Lyoko countless times on his own since the last attack, and for him, this was all still routine. But for Yumi and Ulrich it was a little different; neither of them had even been to factory at all in the past two months, much less Lyoko.

Jeremie was quick and to the point when he arrived, trying not to sound curt and only half succeeding. He wasn't trying to be rude, but it was obvious that he still had qualms about operating for Lyoko again. The four of them had barely stepped into the elevator before he started giving orders.

"I'll get the system going as soon as I get to the computer level," he punched the button, pointedly facing the doors and looking straight ahead. "You three go straight down to the scanners."

And that was that, apparently. Yumi and Ulrich exchanged dubious glances, but didn't argue. Odd scowled and folded his arms, displeased with the attitude and feeling a bit miffed that Jeremie could suddenly be in charge after having been neglectful of the whole situation for so long.

The doors clanked and hissed, opening to reveal the small, gray-paneled room the housed the computer and all its controls. Jeremie exited the elevator, heading quickly and directly for the large chair near the center of the room, not bothering to say goodbye or good luck.

The doors closed again, and the lift started sinking down to the next level.

"What is his _problem?_" Odd threw up his hands in frustration as soon as he was sure Jeremie couldn't hear them anymore.

Immediately the air was tense. "Well you can't expect him to be perfectly happy and friendly again overnight, can you?" Yumi folded her arms.

"He hasn't done this for a while; he's probably still getting used to the idea." Ulrich added.

"Oh, so you're both on his side, right?" Odd huffed out the elevator doors as soon as they opened and climbed into one of the scanners without waiting for any sort of response.

Ulrich watched the scanner doors slide shut over Odd's angry features and shook his head. They'd managed to get the team back together again, in one sense or another, but things were obviously not starting out very well and he didn't imagine that they would get much better. He heaved a sigh as he stepped into his own scan chamber, wondering how much time it would take for them to all be friends again, the way they'd used to be.

--

Aelita was waiting for them as their figures materialized in the shimmering, heat-ridden air above the desert sector. Yumi hit the ground first, bending her knees to absorb the impact of landing and then straightening to greet Aelita. Ulrich thudded to the earth a moment later, and finally Odd touched down in a feline crouch, tail twitching.

Aelita gave them all her characteristic smile and a wave. "It's been a while since I've seen you all on Lyoko."

"_I've_ been here." Odd reminded her bluntly. "Target practice, remember?"

"We all know that, Odd. You've told us. What she meant was seeing all of us here together, at the same time." Ulrich clarified.

"Whatever." The purple-clad nekko checked the stock on his arrow launcher, sighting down his arm none-too-discreetly in Ulrich's direction.

"Can we not start this with fighting among ourselves?" Hands on hips, Yumi regarded the boys like a mother running rapidly out of patience. "Something tells me that that would be practically like handing the victory over to Xana."

"Hey, I'm not the one who has a problem working with my friends." Ulrich muttered.

Odd snapped open his mouth, ready and willing to escalate the fight with a hot retort, but never got the chance. Strangely, it was Jeremie who interrupted and put an end to the bickering. His voice came across their communications system, tinged with the familiar crackle of computerized static. _"I've got the Sector Five access point isolated. Do you guys want directions or what?"_

"By all means." Yumi responded emphatically.

"I know the way, Jeremie," Aelita acknowledged him. "I had the time to map out this sector before you all came."

Surprised, Ulrich raised his eyebrows at her. "You've been planning this for a while, haven't you?"

"Odd's not the only one who's been busy on Lyoko," the humanoid answered him with familiar, playful coyness as she started jogging away from the tower.

Yumi fell into step beside her, clearly impressed. "You mapped out the entire desert region?"

"Actually," Aelita replied, her features turning a bit more pink than usual, "The entire desert, mountain, and ice regions. All the information is logged in Jeremie's files and I…ah…memorized, it, too."

Ulrich's jaw nearly dropped at that. "You _memorized everything?_"

Aelita nodded humbly. "Well, except for the forest region, I didn't get to that one yet, and of course Sector Five…"

"_Erstaunlich._" Ulrich looked amazed. "Aelita, if you ever get to materialize permanently, and get enrolled in our school, remind me to pair up with you in geography class."

Although mostly flat, the desert region was prone to the occasional large rock formations. It was one such landscape irregularity that they were approaching as Aelita led them to the edge of the sector—a group of tall, jagged stones that jutted skywards like gaping teeth.

It was something scuttling between the rocks that caught Yumi's eye, and she was the first to voice dismay. "Oh, no…"

The others were quick to catch on to what she had already noted. As they drew closer, slowing with each step, they could pick out more and more individual shapes moving among the rocks. A large group of Xana's monsters milled throughout the area, patrolling the very extraction point to Sector Five that they were heading for.

"Crud, we've got company." Ulrich unsheathed his sword in one smooth motion, his voice turning dark. "It looks like Xana was expecting us."

_"What?"_ Jeremi's voice carried a considerable amount of incredulity. _"What do you mean, you've got company?"_

Ignoring Jeremie, Odd cocked his wrist at a Krabe that was not too far away. "Again? Damn it, even when we make the first move, Xana's still ahead of us!"

"Maybe he figured it out from Aelita's files," Yumi opened a fan with a decisive snap.

"Or maybe he's just been biding his time, _waiting _for us to make a move." Ulrich took a defensive stance at the head of their formation. "Jeremie, why didn't you tell us there were monsters blocking the route?"

_"What's going on? There are monsters there?"_

"Duh, Einstein." For the first time, Odd seemed to be using the nickname in a derogatory rather than friendly manner.

"You can't see them on the scan?" Aelita sounded concerned.

_"No! I can't see anything but you four. The entire area is clear!" _Outside Lyoko, they could almost hear the clacking of the keyboard as Jeremie typed, running diagnostics on the systems and trying to discern what was wrong with his monitor program.

"Something must be wrong with the supercomputer," Aelita reasoned. "But I haven't made any changes to your programs, Jeremie."

_"Neither have I."_ Now Jeremie sounded more resigned, more distracted. _"How many are there?"_

Yumi did a quick, rough count. "At least twenty."

"More like thirty," Ulrich added.

The odds were not good. It was rare for each of them to take out more than three monsters each, Aelita not included. There were four Megatanks, six Krabes, at least that many Bloks, and practically a dozen Kankrelat scattered among the larger enemies.

Ulrich thought quickly. "We could try another sector—"

"It wouldn't matter." Aelita interrupted him and gave the horde in front of them a frustrated look. "If Xana already knows we're here, he'll send monsters to cut us off no matter what area we try."

Several of the monsters turned in their direction, focusing strange eyes on the group of humans. A few of them stopped and continued to 'look' at them, but otherwise remained still. Others simply turned away and continued as though they hadn't registered the appearance of the humans.

"They're not making any move to attack," Ulrich said, wary of their enemy's lack of action. "Maybe we should—"

A sound like a shot exploded through the air and one of the Kankrelat reeled from a direct hit to its target, then dissolved into fragments. Instantly the other monsters were active, moving towards them and firing lasers.

Ulrich whipped around to glare at Odd.

Odd shrugged and fired another arrow, this time taking out one of the Bloks. "This isn't half as many as I fought one time. We can take them."

Furious, Ulrich carelessly reflected several lasers, not caring whether they ricocheted back to hit the monsters or not. Gesturing wildly towards the nearest rock formation, he shouted to the girls, "Yumi, Aelita! Get behind it, now!"

Both obeyed immediately, Aelita running for the shelter as Yumi covered their retreat. Using one of her fans as a shield, Yumi flung the other at an oncoming Krabe. The fan arced gracefully in midair, flying wide by several feet and missing the target completely. Muttering a curse, Yumi caught the fan on its return and ducked behind the rock. "I'm out of practice," she complained to Aelita, peering around the corner of their shelter in search of another opportunity to attack.

Odd stood out in the open, apparently in no hurry to get to safety with the others. Calmly, he went down on one knee to let a laser burn harmlessly over his head, then fired three more rapid rounds into the horde of monsters. The first arrow shot through a Blok, hitting the dead center of its target. The second took the legs off a Kankrelat; the little monster stumbled and flopped to the ground, its body still intact. Behind it, a Krabe unwittingly stepped forward and skewered the Kankrelat's head with its tapered leg, finishing the job that Odd had started.

The final arrow flew past the front line of monsters towards a Megatank that was just opening. The giant, shielded orb had barely cracked its casing when the arrow exploded through the opening and lodged in the Megatank's target with precision aim and timing.

Odd smirked.

He skipped left to avoid another laser, then raised his hand and squinted to begin sighting down his arm at the next unfortunate target. He didn't get the chance to fire, though, because in the next instant he felt a hard tug on his collar as Ulrich had latched on and began dragging him out of the line of fire and towards the shelter of the boulder.

Once they were safely behind the rock formation, Ulrich whipped Odd around by the collar and slammed him back against the rock face. "What do you think you're doing?"

"What we always do," Odd retorted, sounding impatient. "Taking out Xana's monsters."

"This isn't like getting Aelita through to a tower!" Ulrich practically hissed. "We're here to go _with_ her to Sector Five! If we get wiped out in a firefight and rematerialized now, how is she going to infiltrate the sector and get the information we need?"

"_I still have a blank materialization card."_ Jeremie had diverted enough of this attention from scanning the supercomputer's programs to overhear their conversation. _"If one of you does lose all your life points, I can upload that and bring you back to full health."_

Odd gave a careless grin. "There, you see? Einstein has us covered."

Ulrich glared at the sky. "Jeremie, you're not helping!"

"If anyone should be materialized twice with the spare card, though, it's Odd." Yumi nodded at him. "He's taking out more monsters than you and me put together."

Aelita spoke up, "I agree. Even if we didn't like the idea that Odd was spending so much time training on Lyoko, we can still use it to our advantage."

"Don't encourage him!" Ulrich looked exasperated.

"Too late!" Odd gave a little twist to pull himself out of Ulrich's grasp, then grinned and clambered up the rock face that was giving them shelter. He found a spot near the top and clung to the edge, poking his head above the uneven rim to aim and fire off arrows whenever he had the chance.

"Oh…_no…_" From her vantage point near the side of the boulder, Yumi's eyes suddenly got wide. "No, no, no…"

Ulrich forgot about Odd and moved to crouch next to her, peering around the side of their sheltered place to see what was causing her such alarm. "What? What is it?"

"There are guardians coming!" She pointed. "_Two _of them!"

Ulrich's gaze followed where Yumi indicated, his face incredulous. Sure enough, they could see two bright orange, glowing orbs floating through the air and coming to join the horde of monsters already in place. The guardians hovered strangely, orbiting each other in slow circles.

"Xana's never sent guardians before! At least, not during a fight with his other monsters." Aelita said, just as confused as the rest of them.

"That's a dirty trick, Xana," Odd shouted at the monster horde from his position. "I never got to practice against any guardia—aww, crud!"

Letting go of his perch suddenly, Odd leapt down next to them. Without missing a step, he latched onto Yumi with one hand and Aelita with the other, and started running away from the boulder, dragging the girls with him. "Move!" he shouted over his shoulder at Ulrich.

Ulrich fell into step with them, and behind them they heard something crash and shatter. Glancing back over his shoulder, Ulrich could see that the entirety of the rock formation they'd been hiding behind had been blown away. An advancing Megatank closed and opened its shell rapidly, as though pleased with itself for having eliminated their defenses.

Now there was nothing but open sand between them and the grouping of Xana's monsters. And now the guardians seemed to be taking action; through the middle of those ranks came one of the orbs of pulsing, flame-colored light. Hovering just above the ground, it began to speed towards them while the other remained behind the line of fire, sliding back and forth as if it were keeping watch on its fellow's progress.

The four of them still in full retreat, Ulrich moved to run beside Aelita. "You still want to go through with this?" he shouted over the laser fire.

"I'll admit," she replied between breaths, "I'm beginning to have my doubts."

Yumi nearly stumbled as a laser hit her between the shoulder blades, but she managed to keep running. "Is there a tower nearby? Transporting to another sector is starting to sound like a really good idea."

Odd was lagging a bit behind them now, turning every few moments to fire arrows back at their pursuers and cover their retreat. He sent one projectile straight at the oncoming guardian, and while he saw the spark of a successful hit, it didn't seem to have any effect. Frustrated, Odd sent off another shot, aimed at a Blok that was running right next to the guardian instead. The Blok's body spun wildly with the impact, and quickly exploded into fragments. Being so close, the guardian was somewhat caught in the explosion, and where it was hit Odd noticed that the smooth, glowing shell suddenly became dented, and even sparked a bit on its own.

The effect didn't last long, and the guardian never slowed, but it gave Odd some satisfaction to know that the rare monster wasn't invulnerable. They just needed a powerful enough blast to destroy it.

"The nearest tower is the one that we came from," Aelita explained. "Near the center of the sector. We're still close to the edge where we were going to transport."

"It's too far," Yumi noted grimly. "We're not going to be able to outrun a guardian."

"Any chance that you have those new vehicles working yet, Jeremie?" Ulrich asked.

"_Only one is finished. It's called an overwing—"_

"Then send it," Ulrich interrupted. He glanced over at the girls. "Yumi, you and Aelita take the vehicle and get to the tower. Odd and I—"

A yelp from behind caused them all to look back over their shoulders. Yumi saw the source, Odd, running to catch up with them, waving his arms wildly and shouting a warning as the guardian sped past him and headed straight for her.

With a short cry of surprise, Yumi spun herself around fully to face the oncoming threat as quickly as she was able. She pulled her arm up in defense, jabbing the sharp edge of the fan at the guardian's surface as it came at her, the fine blade digging deep into the luminous orb. The guardian sparked a bit at the impact point for a moment, but then seemed to absorb the damage—and the weapon with it. Startled, Yumi tried to pull her fan out so that she could attack again, but found it being drawn steadily inside the sphere.

It pushed towards her, taking the handle of the fan and then Yumi's hand as she continued struggling to yank the weapon free. Now the guardian had a hold of her, and it was pulling her slowly in.

Yumi lashed out with her foot, kicking hard and trying to find purchase against the exterior of the sphere so that she could pull her arm back out. All she succeeded in doing, however, was getting her foot stuck in the guardian as well. She struggled more fervently then, a sense of desperation starting to override logical thoughts. The more she fought, however, the quicker it seemed to draw her in.

Then suddenly Ulrich was next to her, diving forward and grabbing her free hand. He held on tight and pulled hard, bracing himself against the ground and trying to help Yumi back out of the guardian's grip.

She was half inside the guardian now, her hand clinging to his tightly and her expression beginning to show signs of panic. Knowing there wasn't much time left before she'd be completely absorbed, Ulrich cast about desperately for something, anything, that might help.

The only thing he saw though was a shimmering in the air as a new, vehicular shape began to materialize. Jeremie was sending the overwing, just like they'd asked. Ulrich ground his teeth in frustration; it was a bit too late to use the vehicle now.

Then he caught sight of Odd, running flat-out for the newly materialized overwing.

"Hey!" Ulrich shouted at him. "What do you think you're doing?"

Odd didn't even grace him with an answer. Instead, the nekko hopped onto the vehicle, grasped the controls to start it, and began racing away in the opposite direction.

Ulrich gaped, completely shocked that Odd would abandon them. As he looked on, he saw Odd take the vehicle out to a good distance and then spin it into a hard u-turn. Adjusting the steering towards the guardian, Odd hit the accelerator.

For a moment, Ulrich was still confused. "What the hell is he—?" Then comprehension dawned, and looked at Yumi incredulously. "_Oh, Gott, _he's going to ram into us!"

The overwing was shaking, thrumming with intolerable speed as Odd pushed it past the breaking point. With the distance closing rapidly, Odd leapt off, tumbling hard on the ground. The overwing sped onward, straight on course.

Ulrich gripped Yumi's hand even tighter. "Hang on," he said grimly, "This is probably gonna hurt."

The overwing smashed into the surface of the guardian, exploding and shattering into fragments of code that disintegrated on impact. In the same instant the guardian lurched and shuddered, then burst, its lighted surface splashing everywhere like liquid before disappearing into nonexistence.

Yumi went flying to one side, slamming into a nearby rock face and then thudding to the ground on hands and knees, her torso sparking. Ulrich was sent careening in the opposite direction, skidding along the sand and raising a wake of dust. His legs flickered with damage, bits and pieces of the underlying grid appearing here and there.

"Yes!" Odd punched the air with success. Hardly had he uttered the word, however, when he realized that his achievement was destined to be short-lived.

There was still one more guardian.

It seemed to speed up, as though agitated by the loss of its comrade. It careened towards Yumi, zigzagging like an angry insect. She was barely on her feet again before it was coming down on top of her. This time, instead of trying to block, she dodged the guardian's lunge and rolled out of the way in an attempt to stay ahead of it.

Ulrich leapt up, ignoring his still-sparking legs, running hard to get back to Yumi. For some reason the guardians were targeting her, and they had barely managed to get her out of the first one's grasp. Now there was no vehicle left to ram into it—he couldn't let it get a hold of her, or there might not be another chance to break her free.

Yumi opened a fan and flung it hard at the guardian. The weapon struck a glancing blow, careening off the curved surface of the sphere. The orb sparked a bit and it slowed for a moment, but the damage wasn't lasting. The sparks died and the guardian sped up again, making a second lunge for Yumi—

—and Ulrich shoved her out of the way. The next thing he felt was the impact of the guardian as it descended on him.

This guardian worked much more quickly than its predecessor. Where the first had tried to draw its victim in slowly, the second wasted no time in striking quickly to surround and absorb its prey. One moment Ulrich was standing before it, and the next he was practically in the center of the sphere.

The guardian's attack, however, had clearly been meant for Yumi. And it seemed to be able to tell somehow that it had not acquired its intended target. It floated for a moment, the orange surface pulsing and modulating with uncertainty. A quick shudder passed through its thick substance…and then it was perfectly smooth again, apparently satisfied with its catch.

It started to leave.

Yumi gave a shout and was back on her feet, running hard after it, with Odd right on her heels. For a moment, it seemed like their chase method might actually work; the guardian was moving much more slowly than before, and they were gaining on it. Yumi raised her arm to throw her fan, and Odd sighted along his hand, both of their attentions focused on the orb in front of them—

—and suddenly a Krabe obscured their vision, its laser charging and firing hurriedly at them. It scuttled between them and the guardian, obviously trying to block their path. Yumi was in no mood to deal with the monster, however, and she tried to ignore it, making a dash underneath in order to chase after Ulrich.

With surprising agility for such a large creature, the Krabe turned sideways and gave a kick with one of its long, tapered forelegs. The limb caught Yumi in the chest, sending her sprawling backwards. She climbed back to her feet, eyeing the Krabe now with frustration. One flick of her wrist extended her razor-edged fan, and a sweep of her arms sent it in a dizzying arc over the monster's head. In midair the fan executed a steep curve on its own, suddenly hissing downwards to drive through the Krabe's target mark. The creature shuddered, swaggered, and then shattered.

The fan buzzed back into Yumi's hand, just as two Blocks moved to intercept her and take the Krabe's place. Yumi grit her teeth, impatient and infuriated. "_Chikushou!_ Don't get in my way!"

Either the Blocks did not comprehend her outburst, or they didn't care. In a simultaneous move, both began powering up their forward targets, showing the glow that signaled an inevitable laser shot. Yumi didn't wait for them to fire. She grabbed both fans in her hands and dove into a somersault, rolling herself under the blast just as the lasers released, feeling the air crackle and burn over her as she did so. She came up between the Blocks, pulling herself into a balanced crouch as the monsters spun rapidly, looking for another lock on their target.

Before they could find her again, Yumi snapped her arms outward, throwing both fans directly sideways, one into each Block on either side. In the instant afterward, she was surrounded by flying bits of shrapnel and dissolving grid as the monsters exploded and vanished.

And still, Xana's minions wouldn't leave her alone. Another Block and several Kankrelat were coming at her, blocking her path and slowing her down. Yumi growled inwardly; there was no time for this. Despite the approaching horde, she broke into a run again, vaulting over a Kankrelat that was scuttling into her path and dodging the upcoming Block. She tried to refocus her eyes only on the guardian ahead…but even then she could tell that it was moving too far away too fast, and she would never be able to catch up.

--

Aelita watched as Yumi tried so desperately to get past the monsters, watched as Odd fired away at their ranks, trying to break through the line, and watched as the guardian moved farther away with each passing moment. Something had to be done—fast.

In one practiced motion Aelita fell to her knees, threw her head back, and opened her throat. A strong, raw call sounded from her throat and echoed through the landscape, far harsher than the usual clear and vibrant notes that brought Lyoko under her control. It was hurried, more desperate sounding; less of a song…and more of a scream.

The ground seemed to give a nauseating lurch, and then a huge, violent spike of rock and sand rocketed skyward from the smooth piece of earth—directly beneath the guardian. It speared through the glowing sphere, impaling through the center and missing Ulrich by mere inches. The skewered orb burst into fragments, its coded grid barely having time to flicker before it was wiped from existence.

--

It was a Kankrelat that noticed.

The smallest, most humble of Xana's minions, wretched little monster that it was, had to make up for in numbers what it lacked in power. Often ignored and easily destroyed, a Kankrelat was despised as an annoyance, an insect in the monster horde.

But a single, insignificant Kankrelat suddenly became very, very important. Because it noticed when Aelita went down on her knees, lifting her face to the sky and crying out the song that would change the landscape.

It noticed. It turned its eye.

And it fired.

--

Aelita was still calling to Lyoko, the harsh pitch still ringing through the atmosphere, when the laser burned into her side. She felt her body jerk sideways with the sudden impact while damage sparks exploded around her chest and torso.

The pitch of her scream wavered, then cracked, and all of her control over the environment evaporated in an instant. But the connection was still open, and while her voice still sounded in the last instant before it died completely, something changed.

In response to her sudden pain, the landscape erupted. The giant spike of earth, at first thick and solid, now shattered into pieces, bits of uneven rock and shrapnel exploding outwards in all directions. The ground on which it was created began to split, crevasses knifing jaggedly across the surface as the entire area started to give way.

--

With the guardian around him suddenly gone, Ulrich found himself falling. He hit the ground hard, a distant pain shooting up his legs and back as sparks encased him. He groaned and rolled onto his side, trying to get back on his feet and figure out exactly what had just happened. Propping himself up on his elbows was about all he managed to do.

Only a short distance away, he could see Yumi running while Odd fought to keep a Krabe distracted. Yumi was shouting his name, running full-tilt towards him. He started to rise to meet her—

There was a sound like a gunshot, and behind him something exploded. Ulrich found himself on the ground again as a shockwave shoved him forward and bits of shrapnel rained down on his back and head. The sand beneath him was lurching, dropping sickeningly downward as cracks appeared out of nowhere.

Ulrich had no idea what was going on, and no time to figure it out either. Things were happening too fast—one minute he'd been protecting Yumi from a guardian, the next he was falling to the ground and now things were exploding around him and the entire sector seemed to be collapsing from underneath him.

He tried to look up to find Yumi again, but with the sands lurching and shuddering he couldn't seem to find her. He could feel his segment of the ground starting to pitch and twist, the cracks getting larger and the pieces starting to break away. There was another stomach-sickening drop, and he chanced a look behind him only to see a gaping hole in the earth where there hadn't been one before. Chunks of rock and sand were still breaking apart in an ever-widening circle, like a fragmented crater.

Ulrich was near the edge of it—but not near enough. At any moment the ground underneath him would collapse fully and he would fall with it into the void. With no more time to waste, he gathered his feet against what little solid ground was left and made a desperate lunge just as it caved away, his hands reaching out for any kind of solid ledge.

For one miraculous moment, his fingertips caught an edge of sand that wasn't yet shattered. He hung, one-handed, suddenly wondering if this was how Yumi had felt once when she had fallen.

And then that handhold, too, started to break away.

Ulrich didn't think, he just reacted. His hand went to the hilt of his sword, grabbing it tight and pulling it from the sheath. As he fell past, he stabbed the blade into the edge of the sand, hoping that it would somehow catch. Sparks sprayed everywhere as the metal scraped against rock, and, amazingly, came to a jolting halt as it wedged somehow in the rock.

Now Ulrich hung there, suspended several feet below the edge of solid ground, dangling with nothing between him and the void far below. The hilt of his sword was angled downwards and he gripped it hard with both hands, his grasp already unsteady and starting to slip.

--


	4. Should I Die Before I Wake

Disclaimer: See Chapter One. (Didn't own it then, don't own it now, probably won't own it next chapter, either...)

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The moment she saw him fall, Yumi practically dove to the ground, sliding on her stomach to reach over the newly formed edge, stretching as far as she was able. "Ulrich!" she reached for him, her grasp falling pitifully short. She looked back over her shoulder, back up at Aelita and Odd. "I can't reach him!"

Odd whirled. "Aelita! Make a platform underneath him, a ledge, a foothold, anything!"

She met his desperate gaze, the emotion reflected and amplified, her own eyes close to tears. "I can't! I already used up my gaiakinesis, I don't have enough energy left—"

Odd didn't wait for her to finish. He shouted upwards, "Jeremie!! I need another vehicle! _Now!_"

"_I don't have one! The second overwing isn't finished, the programming is still in fragments—"_

"I don't care if it's a stinking broomstick, just send _something!_"

In response, the air next to him started to glow with a simple grid, outlining something as it began to materialize. Odd had to admit, it looked exactly like something with fragmented programming. It started with the overall shape of an overwing, but the outline flickered and pieces of it died, fading from existence. Those that continued to fight for solidification weren't even connected. The platform looked like it had been sawed in half and broken off at the front; the handle controls, not attached to a front panel of any sort, clattered uselessly to the ground the moment they became real.

"_Merda!_" Odd kicked the handles out of the way and grabbed at the two severed pieces of platform. One half sagged unsuccessfully against the ground, and he tossed it aside. The other piece seemed to be hovering, but that was all. It looked like a flat, misshapen skateboard with no wheels. "There's no controls, Jeremie!"

Over the headset, Jeremie was muttering something incomprehensible, creating and modifying computer codes as fast as possible. He didn't have the luxury of time to test or double-check; he had to hope that the code would be correct, and that it would hold out. He pounded the execute button.

On the piece of overwing board, a crude-looking foot pedal of some sort materialized.

Knowing exactly what it was and what it was supposed to do, Odd didn't even bother to try registering what instructions Jeremie might be shouting at him. He leapt onto the board and stomped his foot down hard on the pedal. The board jumped forward violently, and he wrestled with his own balance, lurching back and forth in an attempt to turn it in the right direction. Another second and he had it speeding on course to the edge where Ulrich had gone over.

------------------------------------------

The sword broke.

Never in the entire time that he had been fighting on Lyoko had Ulrich ever seen his weapon break, or even bend. He had deflected lasers and stabbed through countless monsters, never putting so much as a scratch or dent in the metal. But now, by whatever ill chance, the amount of weight that he was pulling on it and the odd angle at which it was driven into the earth had somehow proven to be too much of a strain. And the sword broke.

Ulrich fell and Yumi shrieked, and then Odd was over the edge, plummeting after Ulrich in a hard, desperate dive. The air whistled past furiously as he crouched against the board, clutching with all fours to its now-vertical surface as it shuddered with instability and speed. He was gaining; just another second and he knew he'd be able to reach Ulrich. Digging the claws of his left hand deeper into the board, Odd released his right and stretched it forward toward his friend. He saw Ulrich lift his own hand, fingers stretching to meet him—

And Ulrich slammed into the surface of the void, his form suddenly swallowed by the immediate explosion.

Odd howled and threw his weight backward, yanking the scrap of a vehicle completely upright and miraculously turning his plummet into a violent ascent just short of driving into the void himself. Behind him the white eruption pierced the air, its energy sending forth a shockwave that nearly sent Odd careening completely out of control.

------------------------------------------

Yumi lay where she was, pressed hard against the sandy ground, half-balanced over the edge. Her eyes were as wide as they had ever been, staring in disbelief at what she had just witnessed. A numbness was creeping into her body, but beneath it roiled a sudden, incomprehensible desire to fling herself over the edge and fall into oblivion after him.

A Kankrelat scuttled up to the side and fired its laser into her abdomen. She didn't feel it.

------------------------------------------

Jeremie gasped as Ulrich's code completely vanished from his monitor, and he made such a mad scramble for the second keyboard then that he nearly fell out of the chair. He punched at the keys as fast as humanly possible, typing in passwords and access codes that would let him into the void deletion system of Lyoko. His fingers stumbled at one point, and he cursed aloud as the computer took time to consider his incorrect entry and reset the screen so he could try again.

This had happened only once before—more than a year ago, when Yumi had fallen into the void. Any contact with the void at the base of each region meant instant deletion from the entire system, but from that prior experience Jeremie knew that the human pattern remained in the erasure buffer for a few minutes while the computer processed the deletion.

If he could get into the deleted files quickly enough, he could use the materialization program and bring Ulrich back. Just like he had done for Yumi.

On the other monitor, a large window popped open, displaying a short countdown. Jeremie grimaced; he'd created the timer program after Yumi's close call so that just in case it ever happened again, he'd know exactly how much time he had left before the patterns were completely inaccessible.

The numbers currently gave him ninety seconds.

In the next instant, the access codes gave way and Jeremie was in the erasure buffer. He relaxed just a little bit; he still had more than a minute to find Ulrich's code, and he already knew exactly what to look for. In just a few moments he could have Ulrich back in the real world, safe and sound. But as he scanned for the files, his short-lived relief gave way to rising panic.

_Ulrich's code wasn't there._

Jeremie gaped at the screen, disbelief and horror dominant on his features. He swung his gaze back to the counter—seventy-two seconds. Still more than a minute left, and the patterns should be in the buffer, still accessible.

This time Jeremie glanced at the system name, making sure he was looking in the right place.

He was.

Jeremie scanned the files again, manually as well as electronically, and then a third time. He found nothing.

Forty-four seconds.

His sense of dread only grew as the timer continued its merciless count, giving him an ever-diminishing opportunity to find what wasn't there; to save a friend who was somehow already lost.

Twenty-eight seconds.

A fourth search through the files, and a fifth, each scan more desperate than the last.

Nine seconds.

Still nothing.

Long after the timer had hit zero, Jeremie kept looking.

------------------------------------------

Odd careened back over the edge of the sand, back over solid ground. The board-vehicle was shuddering violently, sparking underneath him with damage from his near brush with the void explosion. It quaked and sputtered, wrenching back and forth until finally it plowed into the ground.

Odd went sprawling hard, practically skidding on his face, not even bothering to try and land with any sort of dignity. When he came to a stop, he lay there for a moment, uncaring. Scrapes burned on his skin, and his torso sparked with damage for the first time since he transported to Lyoko. He focused on the distant sensations, wondering what Ulrich had felt when he hit the void.

A dismayed cry from Aelita snapped him back to reality. He levered himself up on his elbows, twisting backwards to see.

Poor Aelita was trying to fend off nearly a dozen of the remaining monsters on her own, standing valiantly between them and a prone Yumi who continued to stare blankly over the edge where Ulrich had fallen. The little pink-clad humanoid had no more gaiakinesis left with which to fight back, and she had to have been running dangerously low on life points. Still, she held her ground, one of Yumi's fans held in one hand and the broken handles from the incomplete overwing in the other.

She blocked the laser fire from a Kankrelat with Yumi's fan, then hurtled the bulky control handles at it. The awkward, blunt weapon somehow managed to lodge itself neatly in the Kankrelat's head dome, but not on the target mark. Instead of bursting into fragmented code, the little monster merely keeled over, thrown off balance by the weight. It lay sideways on the ground, legs kicking frenziedly as it continued to fire in a useless direction.

A Krabe marched forward, looming over Aelita like an ill omen. As it powered up and fired, she gave a leap, jumping over its laser and landing on its flat top. The Krabe shook itself, trying to dislodge its occupant. Aelita swayed dangerously, trying to keep her balance as she whipped open the fan and sliced down into the eye mark.

The monster blew apart, and Aelita went flying, landing none-too-gently on the ground and directly in the sights of another Kankrelat. The monster wasted no time in firing. Aelita cried out again as her torso sparked from the hit; she scrabbled to get to her feet, to get out of the way of danger.

Still on the ground, Odd awkwardly pulled his arm around, firing two rapid shots as he tried to line up his launcher with the Kankrelat as quickly as possible. One arrow flew wide while the other buried its tip in the ground near the monster's spider legs.

Distracted by the attack from a new angle, the Kankrelat swiveled, forgetting Aelita for a moment. Aelita used the small advantage to full capacity, dashing and leaping towards Odd as he continued to lay down cover fire.

Odd grimaced, sending another arrow spinning at a Kankrelat that crouched next to Yumi. "Yumi, don't just sit there!"

Oblivious to the situation that she was putting both her remaining friends in, Yumi continued staring over the edge, her eyes fixated on the distant void, not even flinching when the Kankrelat exploded and bits of shrapnel struck her arms and face. Another laser, from somewhere behind them, struck her motionless figure between the shoulder blades, causing even more sparks of damage.

Gritting his teeth, Odd whirled to find the source of the new attack. "Jeremie!" he screamed, not caring if he sounded desperate, not even knowing what he was calling out for. "_Jeremie!_"

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Jeremie watched the screen as everything fell apart.

Odd was shouting at him over the speakers, and Yumi was motionless on the screen, taking damage at an alarming rate. Aelita was running rapidly away from monsters that he couldn't see, and Ulrich was somehow gone. He couldn't understand how it at all gone so wrong so quickly…

"_Jeremie!_"

The sound of his name through the headset jolted him back into a conscious frame of mind. He grasped at the keyboard with one hand, leaning forward and calling back into the microphone at the same time. "I…I'm bringing you back! All of you!"

A dread, cold feeling settled in his stomach as he began to realize just how stupid he'd been over the past few months. He had ignored his work on the Lyoko programs and let them sit idly, unattended for weeks. If Xana had used that opportunity to modify the supercomputer's programming so that Jeremie could no longer detect monsters, what else might he have done? Xana could have tampered with whatever he wanted—the vehicles, the towers, the virtualization program—anything.

As for the materialization program, Xana had been the last one to use it when he'd materialized himself on earth to infect the water supply. If it had somehow been tainted, or Xana had modified it in Jeremie's absence, there was no telling what might happen.

But it was too late now. Jeremie had no time to check the program to make sure it was functioning properly and clean of any viruses. There was no time to try another course of action. He needed to bring all of his friends back to the real world, _now._

He activated the program, hoping that he wouldn't regret it.

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The window on the screen blared at him, alarms sounding off through the headset as bright red warning symbols sprang to existence over the materialization program. Jeremie swore and yanked his headset off, the shrill sounds still coming through the speakers even as he tossed it aside.

A moment later, he almost gave a breath of relief as he scanned the computer information and realized that the alarms weren't due to any interference from Xana. His programs weren't being hacked or infected, but that didn't make the situation any better. The systems were failing, seizing up.

Jeremie typed inquiries, but he already knew what must be happening. He'd left the system inoperative for too long, and he'd put it under too much strain in the past few minutes. The vehicle program was the main culprit; when he sent the fragmented overwing to Odd, the computer had of course been trying to run an unfinished program, and it had started to freeze. Now it was spreading to the materialization sequences, and from there it could affect the virtualization…

Jeremie's fingers flew across the keys, trying to quarantine the damage. If they lost the virtualization programs, there would be no way for them to get to Lyoko. In defiance of his efforts, the error windows continued to flash on the monitor. After a few moments, a new one popped open, and then another.

_Don't do this to me!_ Jeremie thought viciously at the computer. It wasn't working. He couldn't fix it as long as the programs were still operating, and he couldn't stop them because they were frozen. The scanners hadn't activated yet and materialization could go down at any moment…

He stopped moving, stopped breathing, his fingertips poised motionless over the keys, head cocked down in tense concentration. From the floor below, vibrations suddenly emanated upwards and a low-pitched thrumming sound spread beneath them.

Jeremie let go a breath of relief – the scanners were working. They were coming back.

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Yumi was the first to rematerialize, her scanner sliding open with a familiar _whoosh_ and the lights inside making her shadow stretch across the floor. She stumbled out, catching herself on the scanner to the left, which began to hum and glow as she steadied herself against it. The doors opened a moment later and Odd tumbled out unceremoniously, gasping for breath and trying to shake off the effects of returning to their plane of existence.

When the third scanner activated, both of them turned their heads, staring at it. Yumi took a few halting steps towards it, eyes wide and unblinking, waiting for what seemed like forever before the doors finally opened. There on the scanner's floor, looking like she'd fallen down somehow during rematerialization, sat Aelita, blinking at the light and looking bewildered.

"Aelita." Yumi said her name strangely, like a statement. Then she turned and dashed into the elevator, slamming her hand against the access button, not bothering to wait.

The elevator doors closed, leaving Odd and Aelita in the scanner room, listening to the cable car ascend without them. Odd gave Aelita a sad look, then stepped over the threshold of her scanner and offered a hand to help her up. "Hello again, Princess. Welcome back to Earth."

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Author's Notes: Hi everybody! Thanks to everyone who gave a review, you have no idea how much I appreciate hearing your thoughts. Just thought I'd toss in a quick update this time, see if maybe I can shorten the chapters and keep the posting momentum going this time.


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